Seriously FFG.. I thought better of you. I come to your site 15-20 times a day just looking for new stuff to read.. but I do my best to avoid facebook. Either give us the article to read or don't. Don't dangle it in front of us.
What the heck is this "like us on facebook to get more info" bs?
I don't suppose you were actually looking for an answer, but I'll provide you with one anyway. It's called MARKETING. FFG is a business and they're simply attempting to leverage social media to increase the visibility of an exciting new product. This will lead to increased sales which is one of the goals of a business. Normally, there is no incentive for a person to "like" or share a product link. This provides some small incentive. It's not friggin' rocket science dude. Chill out.
FWIW, when I "Liked" it, the page said that I "and 249 others like this." So they owe us the article now.
252 Likes…
How is the article 'unlocked' because it wasn't automatic on the Runner article page.
How many likes does it take to get to the center of an FFG Article?
a-one…
a-two…
a-three…
CRUUUNNNCCCHHH
Three!
I don't care for Facebook either and find marketing stuff through Likes distasteful and bothersome, but it doesn't upset me. It's just an article.
Well, judging by the comment "as well as a chance to unlock a complete list of all the cards in the Android: Netrunner Core Set" at the end of the latest news article, we can expect more Facebook-related shenanigans.
OMG!! Using one of the most successful websites in the history of the world as a marketing tool! WTF!
Of course they are using facebook to help market their products. They are not morons.
Toqtamish said:
Of course they are using facebook to help market their products. They are not morons.
jhaelen said:
Toqtamish said:
Of course they are using facebook to help market their products. They are not morons.
Unlike the morons using Facebook. Cheers!
LIKE!
This is the age we live in. Social Media is a powerful tool. You can choose to participate in it or not, but companies will always attempt to leverage their customers into greater resources. Every giveaway ever, every piece of branding, every attempt to create a sense of belonging or fidelity is aimed at this purpose.
You can choose to be upset by it, but your decided emotional state is going to have very nearly zero impact on any companies decision to use these methods as long as there is a provable net positive benefit. IOW, you should already be used to it, and if you aren't you should learn to because it has existed from the first days of capitalism and will exist as long as it is around. The only that changes is the form of it.
Penfold said:
This is the age we live in. Social Media is a powerful tool. You can choose to participate in it or not, but companies will always attempt to leverage their customers into greater resources. Every giveaway ever, every piece of branding, every attempt to create a sense of belonging or fidelity is aimed at this purpose.
You can choose to be upset by it, but your decided emotional state is going to have very nearly zero impact on any companies decision to use these methods as long as there is a provable net positive benefit. IOW, you should already be used to it, and if you aren't you should learn to because it has existed from the first days of capitalism and will exist as long as it is around. The only that changes is the form of it.
LIKE!
Toqtamish said:
LIKE!
+1!
I don't recall any of the other FFG games/articles asking for "X likes" to get additional content, but as far as this game is concerend, it really makes sense. We're talking cyberpunk and computer hacking here. Utilizing Facebook to promote the game seems like a no-brainer. You are using exisiting media to advertise a game about future media in a computer world. Sure, it annoys some people, but in the end there are many of us who use Facebook, personally and professionally, and I'm not going to knock FFG or anyone else for that matter in trying to leverage social media to promote their products.
JerusalemJones said:
I don't recall any of the other FFG games/articles asking for "X likes" to get additional content, but as far as this game is concerend, it really makes sense. We're talking cyberpunk and computer hacking here. Utilizing Facebook to promote the game seems like a no-brainer.
It's like granting the corp a free tag every game turn - good luck with that tactic, neophyte runners!
jhaelen said:
Toqtamish said:
Of course they are using facebook to help market their products. They are not morons.
Unlike the morons using Facebook. Cheers!
Like
Poke
Friend Request Sent
Spam your wall with game apps
Use "lol" on all your updates
jhaelen said:
JerusalemJones said:
I don't recall any of the other FFG games/articles asking for "X likes" to get additional content, but as far as this game is concerend, it really makes sense. We're talking cyberpunk and computer hacking here. Utilizing Facebook to promote the game seems like a no-brainer.
I'd argue the opposite. Anyone who's interested in 'hacking' is likely to be also interested in computer security and caring about what happens to your personal data. Feeding the Facebook corp your data without thought or recompense seems like a weefle-move.
It's like granting the corp a free tag every game turn - good luck with that tactic, neophyte runners!
Yeah but at the same time, our hypothetical hacking enthusiast is also going to understand that "Likes" on a social networking site (of all things) are more like usenet posts than they are like social security numbers, and would be less susceptible to the knee-jerk "they're mining my datas!" alarmism that seems to have gripped the popular consciousness.
I agree with the people who don't want to use facebook (no surprise, I'm one of them). The main problem is that too many people don't seem to realize that most of what they put there is accessible to a lot of people (shame on Facebook, the default is wide open access for everything). This is of course in addition to the problem of Facebook itself having access to your data. However, nothing forces you to put in your real name or any other identifying data (though people will have a hard time finding you if you do that).
The real problem is hipsters who won't shut up about how they don't even have a Facebook account .
We get it. Good for you. No one cares.
ffaristocrat said:
The real problem is hipsters who won't shut up about how they don't even have a Facebook account .
We get it. Good for you. No one cares.
Yeah those hipsters all worried about privacy, personal freedom and security.. what a bunch of jerks!
subochre said:
Yeah but at the same time, our hypothetical hacking enthusiast is also going to understand that "Likes" on a social networking site (of all things) are more like usenet posts than they are like social security numbers
I think you may not be aware of how Facebook "Likes" work and how the can be evaluated _if_ you have a Facebook account. If you _don't_ have an account, you're quite right; then it's about as dangerous as what I'm doing (i.e. using the same username on several sites in the internet).
The problem with Facebook isn't that it's the most popular social networking site. I don't have anything against social networking sites per se and I'm even a member in one. The problem is how Facebook in particular treats your data. As a default you're wide open to the world, and while there are (horribly complicated) ways to _limit_ the amount of information that is available about you, the average user is either unaware of them or doesn't properly understand them (and, as ffaristocrat so aptly proves, sometimes also simply doesn't care).
One of the most striking problems is that everything you make accessible to your friends is also automatically available to all of your friend's Facebook apps . Essentially this means unless you don't make _any_ information available to them (or they don't use _any_ apps), your data is immediately known everywhere and by everyone.
Oh, and before I forget it: Don't take my word on any of this. Inform yourself, read up on Facebook and their security settings and make up your mind.
Yeah, I did know that. In dismissing it as "just" a social networking site, I'm not saying that their practices are especially innocuous, but rather that the data that's being mined is not any more compromising than whatever the app designers could have obtained in bulk from a junk snailmail marketer, unless there's a "Like if your mother's maiden name is Smith and your bank account number ends with 67890" group that I'm unaware of. I mean, what are they going to do with the knowledge that I Liked "Profiling the Suspects" on fantasyflightgames.com, try to send me a virus attached to the world's most clumsily personalized email? And why should I be any more worried about this than about all my other publicly available data?
Mind you, I agree that facebook is a pretty sucky organization in a lot of ways, and that there are a lot of things they should be doing better; I'm just saying that anyone who takes reasonable precautions doesn't have much to worry about. I do also happen to think that the ignorance of the average facebook user is horribly exaggerated, as is the complexity of the privacy settings--when they as much as change the default messaging settings, for the next month my feed is full of links saying "this thing changed; uncheck this box" (and I don't think my peers and former classmates are all that exceptional). But we're not talking about the average facebook user, but whether a savvy and security-minded individual would refuse to Like anything on principle…and, as I say, I think that level of alarmism is not a sign of acumen, but rather the opposite.